The present invention relates to fishing rods, and particularly to an improved handle for bait casting rods.
In fishing using bait such as fish eggs, shrimp, and the like and using plugs and other lures of significant weight, it is often desirable to use a fishing rod and a reel known as a bait casting reel. Such a reel has a rotatable spool mounted with its axis of rotation horizontal and transverse to the length of a fishing rod on which such a reel is mounted. A crank mechanism and a brake are normally provided to control winding and unwinding of line from such a reel, but during casting, in order to control the distance of a cast and to prevent line remaining on the spool from becoming tangled as a result of the continued rotation of the spool after the bait has hit the water, it is usually necessary to control the spool by applying pressure to it using the thumb of the hand in which the rod is held during casting. It is therefore very desirable to hold the hand in a position behind the spool of a reel used on such a rod. With many previously available casting rods, however, it has not been easy to reach the spool of a casting reel mounted on the rod.
While it is usually desirable to maintain tension in a fish line while playing a fish, by holding the fishing rod so that the line causes non-longitudinal pressure to be applied to the tip of the rod, thus bending the rod, some line tension is, nevertheless, applied to the reel in a direction longitudinal of the rod. It has therefore been found desirable in the past to provide a pistol grip portion of a rod behind the mounting location for a casting reel and some other types of reels, so that the rod cannot be pulled out of one's hand by a strong fish.
Some fishing rods are equipped with butt extensions or "fighting butts", which may be used to provide additional leverage to apply tension to the line while a fish is being fought. In the past, however, it has not been shown how to provide a fishing rod having all of the benefits of an extended butt together with the advantages of a pistol grip, without some interference of one with the other. As an example, Williams U.S. Pat. No. 2,084,931 discloses a pistol grip attachment for use on a deep sea fishing rod having an extended butt portion. The Williams pistol grip, however, provides no increased ability to "thumb" a casting reel mounted on a rod equipped with such a pistol grip.
Hanson U.S. Pat. No. 980,942 discloses a rod having a pistol grip and a butt extension directed rearwardly from the lower end of the pistol grip. While this arrangement has utility, the rearward extension of the rod is not in a particularly advantageous position for providing the desired additional leverage useful in fighting a fish.
Browne U.S. Pat. No. 2,149,837 discloses a fishing rod handle having a rearward extension including a curved elbow seat. Like that of the Hanson rod, this rearward extension is also located at the lower rear end of a pistol grip portion of the Browne rod handle.
Loutrel U.S. Pat. No. 2,283,816 discloses a fishing rod having a pistol grip located beneath a casting reel. A handle coaxial with the rod, however, interferes with the possibility of "thumbing" the spool of the reel.
Garner U.S. Pat. No. 2,911,750 discloses a casting rod handle having a sloping pistol grip and a downwardly-extending trigger, but no rearward extension of the rod's butt portion. Teetor U.S. Pat. No. 2,000,263 discloses a somewhat similar fishing rod handle which is pivotable, but discloses no rearward extension of the butt of the rod.
Steinle U.S. Pat. No. 3,196,572, and Cole U.S. Pat. No. 2,194,639 also disclose pistol-grip casting rods including a trigger-like portion and holding a reel within reach of the user's thumb.
What appears to be lacking in the previously known fishing rods, however, is a rod including a pistol grip providing access to the spool of a reel so that it can effectively be controlled by the pressure applied by the user's thumb, together with a rearward extension of the butt portion, located so as to be useful in applying leverage to the rod, but so as not to interfere with casting.